Originally posted by Burning thought
well considering the flood needs food wheras the zerg are not offically stated to eat they simply get produced and then dont eat at all as far as i can remember i havnt read anything saying they eat, they sort of use their drones to give nutrients to hive clusters which then create the larvae,
And does it make sense to you that a Zerg, being a basic primal biological organism, does not need to find some way of maintaining it’s strength? The problem with that is that it defies the laws of nature itself to even suggest that something does not require forms of nourishment in order to keep functioning. Everything comes with a price, Burning though, and that includes bodily functions. You cannot create something from nothing at all.
Have you never studied Newton’s basic laws? Energy cannot be created or destroyed, it’s only transferred. The Flood use the biomass inside their host bodies to maintain functions, injecting certain streams and agents into their host to make it more effective for whatever purpose suits it. The Zerg cannot simply keep function or using their forms of attack without needing to feed and replenish themselves at one point or another. Do you honestly think that their regeneration can be achieved with absolutely nothing at all?
For example, a Mutalisk cannot continuously produce acid attacks because it is going to run out of water at some point or other and it needs water to create acid and the mucous covering that protects their own bodies and internal organs from the acidic blood, and it isn’t as if a Hydralisk is born with an infinite amount of acid spines ready to shoot, it must replenish them.
Besides, Zerg have been known to eat. Read Liberty’s Crusade again, the segment in Anthem base where Mike first encounters the brain eating larvae and then after Swallow gets chewed in half, the rest of her body is missing, presumably dragged away and devoured (seriously, what use would Zerg have with a pair of dead human legs other than to eat?) then when the rest of her body is dropped down into the tunnel, something moved, confirming the presence of something malicious below, very predictably Zerg.
Even if they don’t feast on their actual enemies, the one confirmed and stated source of Zerg nourishment is none other than the Creep itself. It’s nutrient rich, produced by hatcheries and colonies and full of the necessary nourishment to keep the Zerg structures up and running. If anything, the Zerg probably eat that, but anything living needs some sort of sustenance at one point or another.
Originally posted by Burning thought
so in truth theres no cold fact that the flood do out number the zerg,
No, as I said the Zerg probably do outnumber the Flood in base terms, but the Flood breed
exponentially. That’s not a term taken to be lightly, it’s a growth rate that feeds on itself as a factor and their growth rate
accelerates constantly as long as there is a source of viable prey to be had. They sometimes don’t even need prey either, Infection forms can enter incapacitated and dismembered Combat Forms and turn them into Carrier forms, that spew out even more infection forms to battle.
Originally posted by Burning thought
i mean i can see the speed at which they breed but it doesnt seem that much faster to the zerg,
Can the Zerg, from a meager few hundred, breed to the point where it would take less than a week to overpower an entire installation and the considerable forces surrounding it, take over their weapons, take over their ships, and try to escape?
No, the Zerg are fast at reproducing, but they’re steady and under control. You’re letting your fanboyism overwhelm you again.
Originally posted by Burning thought
especially since the flood need hosts, wheras the zerg can constantly reproduce as long as theres nutrients, however theres nutrients across many worlds
the zerg control so nutrients are unlikely to be a problem in this battle if this is a fully strength zerg army.
And what do you expect the Zerg to do, transport their nutrients on another world to the one that the conflict itself is taking place? Do you expect them to ferry their troops over from another world onto the one with the conflict itself? That isn’t practical nor is it realistic in terms of war, Burning. It would be highly inconvenient, not to mention time consuming, to transport troops from and between worlds.
And if they tried, they would utterly fail, because of said capabilities of Covenant and UNSC space-faring ships earlier mentioned. Flood controlled ships would be able to effectively mount a near impenetrable barricade against transport, whether for resources or for troops. They can detect and gun down any approaching Zerg in space without the Zerg even being able to remotely get close enough to fire a shot, let alone letting Scourge collide for suicide bombs.
The only realistic and practical option left is to touch down and set base upon the world that is slated for conflict between the two races. And if they want to gather resources for a new hive cluster, then workers will have to touch down and ground troops will as well in order to protect said workers instead of moronic Scourge and Banelings exploding all over the place like firecrackers at Chinese New Year’s. Oh dear! There goes our Defiler Mound! Silly Baneling!
Originally posted by Burning thought
So in truth we have no understanding of the size of the flood
Don’t be so shortsighted, Burning, the rate at which both forces can grow in size is at least as important as the actual population itself, if not even more so. It works along the same theory as viruses, they can badly overwhelm the Human immune system even if extremely outnumbered initially. The Flood, because of this exponential nature of breeding and crossbreeding, have been referred to as “parasite” and “disease” by Covenant forces.
What use is a huge population if you know that your enemy will outnumber you eventually anyways?
Originally posted by Burning thought
the Zerg you estimated at about 50 million, wheras the flood could be anything below or beyond.
And might I add, that was me being generous anyways.
See above, population is important, but population growth, density, etc, are as important too and as much of a factor itself as the original numbers were. It’s factually proven that the Flood have reproductive rates that continuously accelerate given a source of prey, any source of prey.
Originally posted by Burning thought
In the games there are not millions of flood are there when you fight them theres groups of combat forms, infections and maybe carriers on average but their not large groups
Dear, dear, another case of extreme shortsightedness. In the games, the part that the Chief explored was only a minute part of the entire installation. And you were fighting hundreds of Flood in said, minute part of the entire installation. Simply because you, as Chief, have not seen overwhelming numbers of Flood doesn’t mean that there’s only that little meager amount. Hundreds were in the Library level alone.
Originally posted by Burning thought
halo 1 at the end theres groups of like 8 infections a couple of carriers and prob like 5 combat forms. Problem with me i just ran through them trying to escape and ended up with aout 10 of such groups chasing me which made it more difficult yet i remember escaping luckily.
What do you want, an “I Survived The Flood” official t-shirt or something?
Remember that the Library was short and cramped and very prone for Flood to come skipping around the corners and from underneath ducts to try and take a chunk out of you. The thing is, that’s only the Flood that was in the Library in the first place, what makes you think that the Flood witnessed and fought by the Chief are the majority, as said above?
The Library was short and cramped and full of halls, obviously there would be a lot less Flood than there would have been in the open, does that make sense?
Originally posted by Burning thought
so far i see the zerg winning still, maybe only just but especially now theres no hard proof that the flood actually out number the zerg which are obviously tougher than the flood one on one, so this battle can go either way depending on numbers
There’s no hard proof that the Flood actually
outnumber the Zerg, but the whole point I’m getting at here is that they reproduce a
lot faster than the Zerg, that’s been factually stated and backed up. This is where my “oh, but there will always be more” idea comes from, from their exponential regression rate of reproduction. The Zerg can’t go from a few hundred to a million in a matter of a few days. And it isn’t as if they are starting out from scratch here, their numbers, if all stockpiled up, are still quite considerable, probably somewhere in the tens of millions from the feeding on Covenant, Human, and Forerunners.